Angry workers hold bosses hostage
Submitted by working class s... on Jan 22 2013 16:26
More than 1,000 migrant workers in Shanghai have gone on strike and held 18 managers hostage following a dispute over the introduction of a draconian new disciplinary policy. Four hundred riot police officers attended to the factory in a bid to free the bosses. There are reports of many workers being injured in the subsequent clashes, including several with broken limbs. Following the incident the bosses have withdrawn the new policy, issued an apology for its introduction, and have promised the workers a pay rise…… Direct action gets the goods!
The workers, employed at the Shinmei Electric plant were furious at the new rules and regulations that will mean heavy fines or dismissal, should people be late back from the toilet, and instant dismissal for making one work related mistake. Angry workers besieged the plant in Shanghai for over two days, rounding up the bosses and forcibly locking 18 of them in a room.
Thousands of Coca Cola workers walk off the job
Submitted by working class s... on Jan 21 2013 21:28
Thousands of Coca Cola workers across Germany are staging a series of short term ‘warning’ strikes this week in protest over their wages. Workers at two factories in Bavaria walked out today, with a further 50 plants expected to follow suit later in the week.
The warning strikes generally last several hours, and are a common tactic used by German trade unions. They are the first step up on the pressure on employers in anticipation of the next round of wages negotiations. Workers are demanding a 6% pay-rise for all of Coca Cola’s 10,600 employees across Germany. The bosses are only prepared to offer a 2% rise.
Budapest: Thirty housing rights activists arrested
Submitted by working class s... on Jan 21 2013 20:21
On the 19th January 2013, homeless activists and their allies squatted an empty building in the 7th district of Budapest. The squatters demanded the institutionalization of a right to housing and an extensive system of social housing instead of punitive measures and overcrowded shelters. The activists were arrested and now face misdemeanor charges because of disobeying police instructions.
“We do not leave until the government and local authorities do not take seriously mass homelessness and housing poverty” – said Jenő Keresztes, one of the homeless squatters. “We are here to raise awareness about the tens of thousands of empty buildings, where homeless people could find their home.
Chicago factory occupiers form worker cooperative
Submitted by working class s... on Jan 15 2013 23:31
First, they occupied the factory to get their wages from the bosses that owned the machinery. Then, they occupied their factory to keep the second bosses from shutting down their machinery. And, now, they are on their way to owning and running the machinery.
The group of workers who occupied their Chicago factory in 2008 and again in 2012 incorporated a worker-run cooperative on May 30, 2012. The factory window makers will take over was formerly owned by Republic Windows and Doors and then Serious Energy, and will now be run by New Era Windows, LLC.
Carlo Tresca: Portrait of a Rebel
Arriving in America in 1904, Carlo Tresca began a nearly forty-year stretch as an active revolutionary. Nunzio Pernicone's definitive biography chronicles Tresca's larger-than-life personality, his revolutionary apprenticeship in Sulmona, Italy, and his subsequent career as fighter for liberty until his untimely death in 1943. The story of his life - as newspaper editor, labor agitator, anarchist, anti-communist, street fighter, and opponent of fascism - illuminates the lost world of Italian-American radicalism.
Among friends and comrades Tresca counted revolutionary luminaries such as Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, "Big Bill" Haywood, Alexander Berkman, Emma Goldman, and countless sovversivi.
Tinley Park five accept non-cooperating plea bargain
Submitted by working class s... on Jan 10 2013 21:07
From Anti-racist action - On January 4, 2013 all members of the Tinley Park Five accepted a non-cooperating plea bargain in which they each plead guilty to three felony counts of Armed Violence in exchange for “lenient” sentences and the guarantee of ‘day-for-day’ good behavior. Jason Sutherlin was sentenced to 6 years. Cody Lee Sutherlin and Dylan Sutherlin were sentenced to 5 years. Alex Stuck and John Tucker were sentenced to 3 1/2 years due to their youth and complete lack of criminal history. Each will be placed upon two years of supervised release upon release from prison.
Before the plea was accepted, the State offered the Tinley Park Five one last chance to betray their comrades in exchange for their freedom. What a waste of time! As anarchist and antifascists, the Tinley Park Five are no more capable of selling out the struggle than their broken system is capable of reforming itself! They laughed at the offer and bravely accepted their fate.
Italian fascist offices firebombed
Submitted by working class s... on Jan 10 2013 15:51
The offices of Robert Fiore’s fascist, ‘Forza Nuova’ party have been firebombed by persons unknown. The fascists have stated that extensive documents, membership information, flags, banners, and a large amount of literature has been destroyed.
The offices in Bonifati are the regional headquarters in Cosenza. The fire was started during Saturday night and quickly engulfed the ground floor before it could be extinguished. Soon after, the upper floors collapsed due to extensive fire damage.
Forza Nuova, whose activists intimidate and attack political opponents, homosexuals, and immigrants, have hilariously labelled the attack as
Lucasville: The untold story of a prison uprising - Staughton Lynd
Lucasville tells the story of one of the longest prison uprisings in U.S. history. At the maximum-security Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville, Ohio, prisoners seized a major area of the prison on Easter Sunday, 1993. More than 400 prisoners held L block for eleven days. Nine prisoners alleged to have been informants, or "snitches," and one hostage correctional officer, were murdered. There was a negotiated surrender. Thereafter, almost wholly on the basis of testimony by prisoner informants who received deals in exchange, five spokespersons or leaders were tried and sentenced to death, and more than a dozen others received long sentences.
Lucasville examines the causes of the disturbance, what happened during the eleven days, and the fairness of the trials.
South African vineyard workers erupt
Submitted by working class s... on Jan 9 2013 17:51
For the second time in the last few months vineyard workers in the Western Cape Province, South Africa have clashed with bosses, scabs, private security goons, and the Police. They are demanding that their paltry wages are doubled, and an improvement in their working conditions. Countless injuries have been reported and at least 50 people have been arrested.
Wildcat strikes have been reported across the Cape region, which is of huge financial importance to the South African state – both in terms of wine production, and the tourist industry….. The government are worried about “business confidence”..
Life of an anarchist: The Alexander Berkman reader
Featuring a new introduction by Howard Zinn, Life of an Anarchist contains Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist, Berkman's account of his years in prison; The Bolshevik Myth, his eyewitness account of the early days of the Russian Revolution; and The ABCs of Anarchism, the classic text on the nature of anarchism in the twentieth century. Also included are a selection of letters between Berkman and his lifelong companion Emma Goldman, and a generous sampling from Berkmans other publications.
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